Dreams, Nightmares, and Everything Between
by BetweenNightmares
Summary: Written as homage to noteasilyoffended's fiction: In a Wild, Wild World. This is a series of increasingly intense moments throughout their journey primarily focusing on Sean. This story follows his feelings and interactions with Daniel under an increasingly incestuous lens. Think of this as a companion to their work, and if you haven't already, please go read their story first!
1. Chapter 1

**Summary:**

Written as homage to **noteasilyoffended**'s fiction: **In a Wild, Wild World**. This is a series of increasingly intense moments primarily focusing on Sean's point of view. Think of this as a companion to their work, and if you haven't already, **please go read their story first**!

**Notes: **

Complying with guidelines, certain scenes may be omitted from this work on this site. In order to read the full story as intended, please travel over to my profile for the appropriate link to that version on _**Archiveofourown**_.

Thank you!

**Nightmares, Dreams, and Everything Between**

**BetweenNightmares**

**Chapter 1**

Sean awoke to a small body shuddering against his own. It was Daniel, still in the throes of another nightmare about their dad. Those came almost every night, and when they did, Sean knew every time that it brought him one night closer to breaking down and telling Daniel the truth.

He sat upright on their blanket and placed his hand against a small shoulder in the dark.

"Daniel, hey... Daniel! Wake up..."

Daniel stirred again, only this time, he sat upright too with a drowsy and confused glaze over his eyes. It was only in the ember glow of their crackling fire that he could see the remnants of some almost-tears that had formed there.

"Sean? Where are we... Where's dad. Are we okay?" He was looking around, not recognizing anything about their campsite. Not the fire they'd collected logs for, the rock ledge they gazed up at clouds on, or even why he wasn't back in his bed right now - perhaps surprised to find that this reality wasn't the dream instead.

"It's okay, we're out here, remember our cool fire?" He asked, hoping he wouldn't have to expl- lie again. Every time he had to he felt like Daniel was believing him less and less, but what else was he going to do? He needed to wait, at least until they made it out of these woods before he set down with him.

"Oh, right... Yeah, I remember." He replied quietly, and Sean could tell that he was still a bit shaken. Shaken and exhausted, he was too, but he tried his best to hide it by shifting his hips a bit closer, causing Daniel to look away.

"Try and go back to sleep, we have a long day tomorrow, but you'll get chocolate so..." Sean whispered, easing Daniel's shoulders back down against the blanket. "What if I have another nightmare?" He asked, sounding more than a little afraid.

"Don't worry, you won't while I'm here. I'm not going anywhere..." He tucked closer as Daniel shifted onto his side. He took the opening to secure an arm over his little wolf and hug his body closer to his own.

He had forgotten how much he missed the smell of their home, or that he was able to pin it down as any particular thing until he was this close to Daniel. It was the detergent their father used, and that warmth, of no scent at all until he'd been somewhere else a while. Each day it was more faint, losing itself to dirt and sweat.

They both drifted off to sleep soon thereafter, their aching bodies reason enough to try to before the sun rose in a few hours and they'd be back on the road again...

In his own dream he was back in Seattle too, but not at home. He was at that party he didn't want to go to, with the girl he wanted to go with. Only, instead of laying on the blanket - they were underneath it, warm, and snuggling by the fire.

Her body was warm too, soft, yet firm where the bottom of her shorts were planted in his lap. He had his arms around her belly, rocking gently with her to the soothing music of the dying party.

Did he still have those condoms? They should have been in his bag... But where was that? Looking around, he realized he didn't know where it was, or where Daniel was. Daniel? He wasn't here... This was all wrong.

'_Fuck me, where did he go?!_'

Panic.

Sean opened his eyes slowly, only just faintly hanging on to that dream as Daniel squirmed beneath him. His arm and leg were thrown entirely over him, trapping him there under his weight.

He retracted them, yawned, then stretched before curling back up and focusing his eyes on the back of Daniel's head. He was waiting for him to come into focus when Daniel turned around to face him, looking as though he'd been awake for a little while now.

'_We made it another night. Now for the rest of our lives..._' he thought, attempting to offer Daniel what little enthusiasm he could muster by way of a cheap smile. "Everything cool?"

Daniel shifted his shoulders awkwardly, then nodded. "Yeah, no more nightmares. I so don't want to walk again though." His voice was small, tired, and a bit strange in a way that Sean didn't understand. Daniel propped himself up on an elbow and fixed upon the remnants of last night's fire.

"We'll get some food today, promise. And your chock-o-crisp." He added with a chuckle, ruffling his brother's hair before sitting up, earning at least a fraction of the mood he'd hoped for.

When he did begin to rise, he became acutely aware of the strain against his jeans and the ache of having not slept in something more comfortable. All he could think to do was think about everything but what he was most aware of and eventually it'd go away.

'_And maybe a nice clean bathroom for big bro to fap in peace?_'

'_Dude stop..._'

Normally he would deal with it before he got up, during, or by way of having a long shower, but out here with Daniel there was nothing he could do. And he hadn't, not since they began wandering out here, when could he? It became more distracting with each growing day.

It showed in his sketches, he knew, in the lines that weren't so straight and the scrawls that lacked clarity. He drew his best when he could relax, but it was so damn hard to when his hormones compounded on all the other aches and hunger and worry he was already dealing with.

Daniel was the lucky one right now, as that saying went: ignorance was bliss.

He couldn't decide if he was as ignorant as he seemed though. There was a certain furrow to his brows that Sean hadn't seen thus far, not ever. It was the same face he gave when he kicked Daniel out of his room time and time again.

Sean watched as he squirmed onto his feet and went off toward the bushes.

Frustration? Anger? Maybe a little sadness? Some of those, but most of all it looked like confusion and guilt.

'_Did he remember_?'

* * *

The Three Seals Motel wasn't exactly the place he had in mind to have his talk with Daniel, but as Brody had put it, it was better to get through it now than hold off until later. There would never be a good time to do it he had realized, not with this, and maybe it wouldn't have been so bad when it finally came to light if he hadn't waited - and ultimately, let Daniel find out through a news channel about the shooting.

Compared to that, 'the other' talk was easy. Even if it had been both monumentally awkward and a failure on his part. Daniel was way too young to learn about that, or deal with what happened back in Seattle.

It took him hours of holding Daniel and crying with him until he- they could both calm down enough to talk about it, and they talked about it for even more hours to come, face to face in Daniel's bed. The sun was nearly rising by the time they'd gotten any more sleep, another reason he was thankful for Brody. The sleep they'd gotten during the drive there was the most he knew either was going to get for the night.

When morning came he pulled out of bed before Daniel had woken up, taking care to keep from stepping on any broken glass or sharp shards of wood that had broken loose during Daniel's episode last night.

Mushroom lifted her head off Daniel's thigh giving him up as he crept away, sketchbook in arm, watching him as he carefully tiptoed to the bathroom door.

"Sean? Where are you going?"

Daniel's sleepy voice croaked out from his bed. He was nearly sat up and peering through the darkness at him.

"Just going to wash off before we have to go, enano, okay?" He asked, facing back at him with concern. He'd really hoped not to wake him up before he had to.

He grumbled something first, then eventually whispered "Okay... Love you, Sean." Slouching back down and pulling the covers back up over his shoulder. He looked pitiful like that.

"Get some more sleep, I'll wake you up when I'm finished." He encouraged, then opened the door and attempted to close it as quietly as possible.

Sean trudged over to the sink and held the edge of the counter, his knuckles turning white from how hard he was gripping it. In the mirror, a strange reflection stared back at him.

He hardly recognized himself in it, he was dirty and worn out. It was as if he had run a marathon each day since leaving, and he for sure felt like he did. His nose was bruised too, bloody, from the kick he'd received from that asshole at the gas station.

Absently, he moved over to the toilet and sat down for a couple of minutes, pouring through the pages and looking at old sketches so that he didn't have to think about anything to do with 'now.' The concert with Lyla, some doodles of himself as the world around him burned, track, dad grilling some barbecue for them. All of the things that filled up his life.

They all would lead up to Daniel with each page he turned. He was the focus of his entire world now, the only thing that seemed to matter besides getting far away from here, but that had not always been so. It showed more and more as the pages went on. Sure he'd appear in a page or two, but the further Sean turned the more often he appeared, until his sketches were nothing but Daniel, the places they discovered during their journey, and the thoughts scribbled into the corners that he hardly recognized as being his own.

There was Daniel sleeping underneath that bridge outside of Seattle, his arm tucked under his head and his body curled into a ball on the ground. Only their blanket separating him from the gravel.

'_Daniel... He had no idea how he got there, I carried him for miles in the dark. I had to lie through my teeth and tell him we were going on a surprise trip. I guess that's not a complete lie. It's a good thing he was still dazed, he didn't question it that much... I still don't remember what happened after dad was shot, but I know it had to do with Daniel's..._'

Another depicted him sprawled out on his back after their feast at that backwoods diner, shirt raised over his belly and legs spread wide with satisfaction. Probably the only happy one of him lately aside from the one he'd gotten to do last night while watching TV.

He was able to be cute, sometimes. This was the Daniel he wished he could see more often, not the down in the dumps boy back in the other room. It wasn't his fault, he reminded himself, he didn't like himself right now either.

Attached was the recipt.

'_Not within our budget, but Daniel needed this. So did I..._'

How were they going to do this? They only had so much money, and so far to go.

Sean rose up to his feet then carefully eased out of his hoodie and then the shirt underneath. He felt the dirty fabric peel off of his skin as though it had become a new layer of it over the last few days, and watched as it crumpled on the floor with an unnatural stiffness.

Underneath was a large and fist sized bruise swollen against his abdomen, that too courtesy of Hank Stamper. Touching it made him wince in pain, and instead he began to kick off his jeans. They were dirty, but his boxers were far worse.

'_Dad's running shoes have nothing on these_.'

They downright reeked, and the faded orange material clung to his inner thighs as he began to tug them downward. After kicking them off, Sean shuddered and strode over to the shower and turned the dirty metal dial to the hottest level.

Once steam started to billow up from the base of the tub, Sean swung a leg over the ledge and hopped inside - pleased to feel the scalding water begin to cleanse his weary skin. Sean wasted no time in beginning to scrub his body and chip away at some of the grime that had formed there. The Black and brown sediment that had caked his hair slowly began to fill the bottom of the tub as water rinsed over his body, adding to what Daniel had already left behind.

'_I call him dirty, but I think I might have him beat._'

Sighing, he rested his head against the wall opposite of the shower head and let the water beat down over his back, massaging it and finally offering him some means of relaxation.

His thoughts tried to return to that dream, of Jenn, by the fire with her in his lap. And so they did, at first, but the longer he tried to hold onto it, the more it slipped from his mind. That was the very nature of a dream. They returned to those sketches of Daniel, the way his shirt rose to reveal an inch or two of his belly. The way his hair fell against his neck as it hunched watching TV...

Sean opened his eyes and stopped, horrified, guilty, attempting to rationalize that it wasn't his fault for gravitating his thoughts towards his younger brother. Daniel was his only contact for days, the only person he talked, walked, and thought about - had to be.

It wasn't his fault he had hormones, and no way to keep himself from spiraling thoughts stemming from that need to release - but being so unable to... Or so he told himself.

Ultimately, Jenn was a sweet dream, and Daniel was a cruel reality.

'_Shit._'

His dad was great at fixing things, but He realized that all of his own problems were too late to fix, most of them anyway. He would have to nip this in the ass now, never think about this again and carry on like it never happened. That was the only way, he thought, to maintain what little was left of his peace.

After rinsing himself off, Sean turned off the water and wobbled over to the mirror again, wiping the fog off in order to view himself again. He definitely looked like his normal self now, albeit more exhausted than he'd ever been before.

He took care to dry off and get dressed again very slowly, knowing that the quicker he finished the quicker he'd have to wake up Daniel and find the bus station. He wanted to get out of here, and didn't at the same time. Either way, he reminded himself, they had to be out by 11am.

Daniel was up by the time he'd gotten out of the shower, and he was a little surprised to find that the darkly-lit room was now soft blue as the sun had rose high over the water now. He was flipping through the channels, Mushroom scratching at the front door looking frantic.

"She has to go, me too. You take so long in there... Next time we'll leave without you." Daniel grumbled a little, but Sean could tell he wasn't really annoyed. "I guess some things never change, huh?" He replied, pulling his hood up over his damp hair as he strolled across the room and packed up what was left of the free shampoo and conditioner.

"We should get going, the earlier we find a bus the better."

Daniel pulled himself out of bed and trudged into the bathroom for a couple of minutes before he returned with a damp face and pulled on his sneakers by the bed. "Ready." He whispered, sleep hanging onto his voice.

Sean nodded and picked up his old backpack, handing that to Daniel then sliding into the new one Brody had given him. He flipped the TV off and headed for the door, holding it open for Daniel as him and Mushroom passed through.

Heading for the stairs, Daniel broke into a jog to keep up with Mushroom who was bounded for a nice place to pee too. At least she was always able to put a smile onto Daniel's face. Sean laughed a little, speeding up with the two's pace.

They had made it out of the parking lot without anyone noticing them that morning. Thankfully it was still quite early.

Mushroom had peed by the battered metal bus stop stationed by the road as they checked out some destinations and settled for the furthest south that this bus would take them. "We'll be okay enano." He assured Daniel, who had grown quiet as they had sat together, leaned against one another, for another 45 minutes until the bus would come to take them far far away from there...

'_I hope..._'


	2. Chapter 2

The sound of snow beating against their shelter was far louder than the crackling of the small fire they had going. A storm had come, it was too dangerous for the wolf brothers to venture out, and would remain so at least until the following day.

It sounded more like sand to him than snow, the way the blistering wind pelted it at the cabin from all directions. They had found this place weeks ago and decided to stay for a while. It was shabby, but much better and way safer than the shelters they'd checked out.

Daniel liked it better here too, and they had finally started exploring his powers which grew almost every day. It wasn't scary to him anymore, like so many other things they had grown used to on their journey.

The only thing that continued to make him uneasy however, was that cough... It wasn't getting better.

He knew they couldn't stay here forever, the plan was still Puerto Lobos, eventually. He just wasn't sure if Daniel was still on board, he was afraid to even bring it up when he was so happy here. The storm was lucky in that way, they couldn't leave even if they both wanted to.

Tonight their mattress was yanked against the wood stove, both of their bodies pressed arm-to-arm in front of it as that damned blizzard seemed to find every crack in this place and blast through them.

Mushroom was underneath at their knees and hidden by the blanket, soaking in the shared warmth they created. Occasionally, he'd feel the soft flap of her ears against his ankle.

"So cold, I'm glad I have Mr. Raccoon to keep me warm." Daniel commented, knocking shoulders against Sean. Up until now he felt like the choice to take that would have haunted him forever, but now he knew he made the right choice. Besides, that asshole deserved worse than a stolen tent and hoodie for what he did.

"And that you know how to start a fire now. Good job enano, it's getting toasty in here." He smiled a bit and peered into the flames with Daniel, only frowning once Daniel stopped looking his way. It wasn't Hank Stamper or the fire on his mind now.

'_We haven't talked about it... Not since that night, am I the only one freaked out_?'

He was still grilling himself for giving in, for going along with something he knew he should have insisted they drop, but Daniel had just pushed him too hard in a moment of weakness, or so he told himself.

"Do you think this will ever stop. What if it goes on forever and ever, will we be trapped here?" Daniel asked, wiggling his toes before the embers. The sudden question was enough to snap him out of his daze.

"It won't, these storms last a day or two max before they blow on." He assured, glancing over at the ragged bits of cloth that might have once been socks.

"I'll get you some new ones next time I go for food, I promise." He offered, feeling guilty enough not to poke fun at him.

"You could always warm them up." Daniel snickered, wiggling them a bit.

Sean shot him a look of zero amusement.

"Oh really?"

Sean groaned and turned his body around, causing Mushroom to scoot out from beneath the blanket. knowing he'd brought this on himself he declared, "One big bro toaster coming up."

Daniel grinned and turned to face him, the blanket hiding the mountain their knees made together. He scooted further between Sean's legs and raised his feet, watching as Sean leaned forward and grabbed his ankles.

Sean gave them a quick rub to expel the surface coldness and then raised his shirt over both small feet, shielding them again his abdomen.

"Your toes are like ice cubes. Man, you really are coldblooded." He teased, massaging them through his hoodie.

"Shut up, it's a freezer in here." Daniel muttered back through pursed lips. Mushroom had circled the two in search of a new point of entry only to find none. She instead settled for a nice spot snug against Daniel's hip beneath the fire's warm glow.

He couldn't help but look at Daniel, who was peering back at him more closely, it was almost as if he was planning something behind his glowing brown eyes.

"Hey listen, about the other night..." Sean began, lowering his tone even if there was no one was there to hear the two.

"I just wanted to—" his voice was cut off by an abrupt exhale from deep inside his chest.

Daniel had lowered both of his feet to either side of his lap and rocked them up and down, a pleased sneer replacing his once thoughtful stare.

"Daniel, hey— stop." He said at once, sounding a twinge annoyed. It was almost as if Daniel knew that he was going to bring this up. It needed to be, and now Daniel was trying to distract him.

"I'm trying to talk to you, seriously, cut it out." Sean ordered.

"What? I'm not doing anything. You SAID you'd warm my feet..." Daniel responded in kind. The raise in their tones caused Mushroom to get up and move elsewhere altogether. A small whine was all that could be heard before she slumped out of view.

"I was only going to say that we shouldn't do this every night, you know? We're not supposed to, we're brothers." He said in earnest.

"Whatever, I was just playing around. It's not like there's anything else to do in this fucking storm." He grumbled.

"Daniel..." Sean called out, hating how whiny he sounded to himself. It was true, maybe, that he did whine just as much after all.

Would he understand that it was just about comfort? Or would he be disgusted? As much as it threw him, he couldn't imagine it being the latter, or maybe he just couldn't bring himself to.

"Look enano, I just don't want it to get weird, okay? Everything is already weird enough."

"You mean I'm weird."

"No..." Sean frowned a little.

Daniel shot him a bitter glance. "You're the one making it weird, it feels good, and it's fun... Nobody has to know, and no one will." He mumbled, passing another glance that this time looked more akin to a hurt that existed somewhere deep in the both of them.

He was going to break.

The older wolf smirked shamefully and held the blanket open as he lay on his side by the fire.

Daniel elbowed him a little on his way inside the blanket and curled up against Sean's chest, closing his eyes as both the blanket and a pair of arms wrapped around him.

'_Is there any going back now? Or am I in too deep?_' He pondered, their breathing slowing from shallow and heavy to calm and content.

Happy to have his mellow brother back, Sean stroked his hair back which only made him curl tighter.

"I love you enano..." He reminded, listening as the wind outside their cabin howled on and on like wolves in the distance.

"I love you too, always."

"Sleep tight raccoon boy, if this storm clears by morning we'll be able to get in practice tomorrow."

A cough soon followed and Daniel smiled against his chest, dozily murmuring something back which Sean couldn't quite catch.

Tomorrow he'd bring it up, they had to move on... He knew the answer now, because he didn't want to leave either. If he could, he wouldn't mind staying here forever with Daniel. Just the two of them and little shroom... The Wolf Brothers didn't need anyone else.

Before he knew it he was already half asleep, dreaming of a Raccoon chasing them through a field of pine trees, a pack of hounds joining in toe. He imagined up the hunters that were always hot on their tails, and the running...

Endless running...

'_I want to stop running..._'

* * *

Snow was falling again, only this time in small doses that Sean quite enjoyed, Daniel as well. It reminded him of past Christmases here with dad, dad and Karen... It was hard not to think about her, she was everywhere and yet nowhere at all here.

She was in the pajamas that Daniel wore, the silly princess ones that he teased him about every night. She was in the guilty and long reaching stares that Claire made towards him when she thought he couldn't see her. She was behind the locked door upstairs, the one Daniel insisted they should peek inside.

"We can't enano, we're guests here... How would Claire react if she found out we disobeyed her the first night her and Stephen leave us alone?"

He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, staring seriously at Daniel who had been looking at the door from against the balcony railing.

It had been almost two weeks since they arrived here, and only now was it starting to feel remotely like the home their cabin had been. Claire made it seem like the FBI were hiding right outside the front door. She was getting better by the day, but only just barely.

Still, that didn't keep her and Stephen from heading out for evening Bingo, claiming that after missing it last week that her 'gals' would begin to suspect something.

"Okay, okay... It's just that this might be our only chance. Claire and Stephen neeeveer leave us here alone." He quipped, folded pajamas in his arms, but Sean wasn't budging an inch.

"Besides, there's nothing left in there anyways. She took all her stuff when she left." Sean knew that sounded reasonable enough to get Daniel off his case, at least for a while. The truth was that he had no interest in sifting through her stuff, there was enough back in Seattle, hidden in the garage. "Come on, in the shower." He ushered, pushing him playfully by the back toward the bathroom.

'_Daniel is right, this might be our only chance... And I'm going to make the most of it._'

Sean grinned to himself and shut the door behind them. It had been ages since they were in a bathroom this nice, every time he came in here he felt a little less grimy, Daniel too, he never used to be so enthusiastic about cleaning.

"We're going to take a shower, together?" He asked, more excited than skeptical. Daniel had been bugging him to do stuff since they got here, but like he said then, they would have to be twice as careful. They weren't alone in the middle of the woods anymore.

"Yeah, why not? We have at least two hours until they come back." He explained, noticing the two towels Claire had laid out for them by the sink. "Just as long as you don't make a mess."

Daniel made a face at him and outstretched his hand, causing the towels to slowly swirl up into the air and begin levitating toward the shower.

"Superwolf..." He said, trying to sound stern and failing to keep from grinning instead. They were already breaking rules, might as well relax and be thorough tonight.

Sean followed the haunted towels toward the shower and pulled open the glass doors, getting the hot water going and time to warm up before he started on removing his clothes.

'This is nice.' He thought, pulling his shirt up over his head with a strange ease. There was no cling and definitely no smell other than his deodorant. These were the little things he never thought he'd be thankful for.

As he began to unbutton his jeans he noticed that Daniel had barely undressed, instead he stood awkwardly by the toilet and glanced sheepishly over while Sean did alone.

"What's wrong raccoon boy? Cold toes again?" He asked, pausing on his zipper.

"Nah, it's just... We never really get naked is all." He couldn't help but be amused at that, and Daniel could surely see it written all over his face.

"I want to though. I've wanted to for a while." Daniel went on to admit before finally pulling off his own shirt. He was so small, Sean hoped he had been eating enough out there.

"Way to make me feel self conscious, we could of if you just asked. You know, there was a time where the idea of me naked would have grossed you out." He pointed out, kicking off the last leg of his new jeans.

"Shut up, things are different now." Daniel's voice was short and haughty while fumbling over the metal button of his own jeans. Sean took the distraction as the perfect time to slide out of his boxers and hop into the shower, which by that point, was all but calling his name in steam.

"The water feels amaaazing..." He groaned, letting it pour along his back before he turned to face it head on. He rubbed the rain of hot water over his face and through his dark hair, slicking it back. "Daniel!"

"I'm coming, h-hey, wait for me!"

Sean could scarcely make out the vague shape of Daniel's narrow body speeding across the room through the foggy glass. He held the door open and allowed him inside under his arm, then closed it behind him.

Daniel shrunk away from the heat at first, then slowly eased into it after Sean broke his tolerance by dropping a cupped handful over his head. It was all an attempt to tame that wild hair of his.

"Hot, how can you stand it this hot?!" He asked, laughing as hair nearly covered his eyes in rich brown curtains.

"You'll grow to like it, I didn't always either... But it feels nice right? Not -too- hot?"

"It's okay, I'm cold blooded remember?" Daniel smiled and gathered a cupful of the water too, returning the splash attack.

After they were both thoroughly soaked, Sean began work some shampoo through Daniel's hair, as well as his own with the remaining suds.

"How long do you think we can stay here?" He eventually asked, eyes screwed shut while soap ran down his face.

"I don't know. I was hoping at least until after Christmas." Sean hadn't really gave it as much thought as he should have. At first the idea was to wait until Daniel was better, now it was until the holiday was over. These were selfless enough reasons, but the idea of returning to the woods was harder to come to grips with than he though.

Silence from Daniel. It wasn't that far off, and now part of him regret the promise he'd made not to lie again. Would Daniel even see it that way? He doubted it, and now he doubted whether he was going to enjoy the rest of their stay knowing the point that it was going to end.

"I was just thinking. Claire loves having us here, you know? We just can't stay here forever, it isn't safe for any of us." Sean rinsed the last of the suds from Daniel and then stooped low in order to meet his squinting eyes. "Cool?"

Daniel wiped them and lifted a smile. "I guess so." That was the face he wished he saw more of. He made a mental note to try and bring it out as much as he could before they did have to go again.

Sean reached for the dial again and turned off the water. He yanked their towels down from the top of the glass door and placed one under his arm, using the other to begin toweling through Daniel's hair. He dropped to a knee and began rubbing along the rest of him.

Satisfied, Sean took to toweling himself off too before he opened the shower door and stepped out of the steam and back into the cool open air of the bathroom.

"Come on, brush your teeth and then we can hop into bed." Sean instructed, then began setting up his toothbrush, peering at Daniel who stepped to his side.

"We still have like a whole hour until they get back." Daniel reminded him, sticking his own brush in his mouth, all the while pouting at Sean in the mirror.

Sean paused in his own brushing, cheek full of paste as he smirked back at Daniel's reflection.

"I know little cub. Hurry and brush."

"Oh." He said in surprise, eyes going wide then closing coolly. He could be slow to catch on, sometimes.

The two wolf brothers continued brushing their teeth and then dressed in silence, a kind of mutual anticipation forming between the two of them as they finished up in the bathroom.

'_This might be our only chance, I better make the most of it_.'

With time running out before Claire and Stephen returned, the two wolf brothers hurried across the upstairs landing and into the guest room. Daniel handn't spared Karen's door a single glance.

* * *

"I'm really going to miss Chris. Do you think Grandma and Grandpa are okay?" Daniel asked, his body stuffed in the corner of the cable car. Boxes of what seemed to be great saw blades lining the entire cubby.

Everything had happened so fast, he still couldn't believe it. In a single day everything fell apart. It just went on to prove that no matter how safe he began to feel, that they could never be. Not here, and so they were heading south again - to Puerto Lobos.

The only problem they had now was that they had zero money, and California wasn't even half the journey.

"They'll be okay, they can't prove we were there, not without like, a warrant." Sean looked away uneasily, he wasn't sure if they had had one, they got out so quickly... He knew if they did, that harboring a fugitive was a crime.

We're they fugitives? Hank Stamper claimed as much. "But we didn't do anything, they can't prove shit anyway." God, he was so angry... They weren't prepared to be back on the road again, no money...

He tried his best not to let on what he was thinking by staring out of the crack in their boxcar door. The trees passed by so fast, just like their time in Beaver Creek.

'_That's the problem with staying so long. It only makes it harder when we have to leave again._'

Daniel was idly trying out his yo-yo off to his left. He was attempting, and failing, to walk the dog. The haphazard shuffles of the car moving over the track making it that much harder as it rocked both boys every time.

Had they really kissed that night? It was Daniel's first time, and all he could feel like is that he stole it away. At the time, the thought of it was sudden and somehow 'right,' but now he only felt like a thief.

'_A hoodie, a tent... A freaking yo-yo is cool, no problem. But I stole my younger brothers first kiss too, that about says it al_l.'

Part of him wanted to believe that maybe it didn't count. That it was done to shut him up and was purely a result of his own lust. That wasn't entirely true, he wanted to take it... Daniel had all but offered himself to be fucked right then and there. Yet, that was definitely too far. That was the one bridge he'd do anything not to cross.

Sean groaned, nose pinched between his cold and dirty fingers.

Then there was Chris, who's own family dynamic was just as fucked up, just in a different way. Had he been able to help him at all? Charles promised to try and do better by Chris, but how much was the word of a drunk worth?

He'd told Daniel he could write to him when they got settled somewhere, that he wouldn't lose him as a friend the way he might've lost Noah and how he might've lost Lyla...

If Chris really was sent to live with his grandparents, how would they keep in touch? He didn't want to think about it, instead he began watching Daniel tangle up his yo-yo by nearly dropping it.

"Come here..." He laughed, beckoning the young cub over to his side. "I'm not very good, but it's all in the wrist. You can't just yank it hard and hope it works."

Daniel growled at him sarcastically then plopped down beside him, allowing Sean to get to work detangling the thing.

"We'll be okay Sean, I know we will. We're the wolf brothers, remember?" Daniel rose up onto both knees and cupped his hands over his mouth, glancing over to Sean in wait.

Smiling weakly, Sean got up and did the same, throwing his head back with Daniel in a series of long and much needed howls.

"**Awooooooooooo! Awo-awo-awoooooooo**!" They howled loudly, their shares voices just barely dominating that of the train speeding along its track.

Daniel was giggling a bit, probably for the first time since boarding the train, and he couldn't help but giggle too as he began to feel almost hopeful for the first time that day.

"I love you little bro." He said, falling to his back with Daniel. Sean set the detangled yo-yo back on Daniel's chest and then ruffled his hair.

"Love you too, big bro." He smiled back and the two of them stared at the dark ceiling of the boxcar, letting the movements slowly ease them off into a deep slumber.


End file.
